


Baby, It's Cold Inside

by ereshai



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Fade to Black, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Snowed In
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-04 17:07:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1083514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ereshai/pseuds/ereshai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Clint does <i>not</i> freeze his balls off, despite Natasha's best efforts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Baby, It's Cold Inside

**Author's Note:**

  * For [allochthon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/allochthon/gifts).



> Many thanks to notaredshirt for the beta. She's the reason this thing has an ending, instead of an abrupt stop.

There was something fundamentally wrong with going undercover to catch international terrorists in the Midwest. Clint had tried to explain it to Natasha, but she’d destroyed his well-reasoned argument – “It’s just wrong” – with the irrefutable logic that people could be scum anywhere. He hated it when she did that.

There was also something wrong with going undercover in the Midwest in the dead of winter, but that was for entirely personal reasons, the most important one being that Clint hated snow. He hated the cold. And he didn’t like the bulky winter clothes he had to wear to keep warm; he couldn’t move in them. Having to choose between freedom of movement and frostbite was no choice at all. His aim didn’t suffer too badly, but it was the principle of the thing.

He glanced at Natasha and she held up a hand. “I don’t want to hear it.” She got up from the table and put her dirty dishes in the sink.

“I didn’t say anything.” Clint scraped up the last bit of sauce on his plate with his garlic bread and shoved it in his mouth, chewing mournfully.

“You were thinking about it. Stop whining; I’ve heard it all before.” She disappeared into the foyer. Clint could hear the rustling of winter coats.

“A guy can think about things,” he muttered, and he started clearing the remains of their lunch from the table.

“Think more quietly,” Natasha said from the doorway. She was dressed in her winter gear. “I’ll be late tonight. I’ve got a lead on our target I want to pursue.”

Clint nodded. “I won’t wait up, honey,” he said, batting his eyelashes at her.

She rolled her eyes in response. “Coulson will be here this afternoon. Maybe that will cheer you up.”

Coulson was coming for the weekend to do an on-site check-in – SOP for missions like this one. Clint figured SHIELD just wanted to make sure their agents weren’t going stir crazy and then try to kill each other, or decide to join the other side. Coulson probably wasn’t too worried about that second option.

“I don’t see why that would make any difference.” He ignored her knowing look. So he and Coulson got along; they were friends, dammit, it didn’t _mean_ anything. Even if he wanted it to.

“Keep an eye on the weather,” she said as left, ignoring the “Don’t I always?” he yelled after her.

Long-term undercover work made Clint twitchy, and it was always worse when he didn’t have access to his bow. There was a local club where he could use a loaner when it got really bad, but he couldn’t go as often as he liked. He would be there now, but Coulson was on his way. Not that he needed Clint around to greet him or even to let him in the house, but it was only polite. And if the neighbors saw a complete stranger letting himself into their place, they’d call the cops. Clint figured it would be better to avoid that entirely.

He loaded the dishes into the dishwasher, started a load of laundry, and grabbed a cloth for dusting. They lived pretty light when they were undercover, but the house still got messy. He absolutely did not think of Coulson’s spotless apartment while he was working; he always cleaned the house on his days off. Although he didn’t usually dust the top of the cabinets.

Cleaning didn’t take up that much time, and Clint decided to take a shower. Working with fiberglass made him feel itchy all of the time, even after two or three showers. At least Natasha got to work in the office; her direct supervisor wasn’t under suspicion, but she still had access to their real target. Clint wasn’t having as much luck in his position; it didn’t look like any of the shift workers were knowingly aiding and abetting the suspected terrorist. He still wasn’t sure how windmill turbine blades fit into everything, but that’s where the money trail had led them.

By the time Clint finished his shower and got dressed, the sky outside had darkened considerably. A quick look out a window revealed an ominous looking cloudbank in the distance. A few snowflakes drifted through the air, and there was already a light dusting on his truck. He checked the local weather – a blizzard warning was in effect, and it looked like it was going to be bad. Coulson better show up soon.

Clint pulled on his outdoor gear and went out to check the backup generator. The gas tank was full, and they had a couple of full jerry cans in the shed. He closed the storm shutters, thankful the house only had one story. The snow shovel was already in the foyer, and they had plenty of food. He wasn’t sure what else he could do to prepare for the storm, so he slogged over to the next-door neighbor’s house. The little old lady who live there – Mrs. Ann Haugen, though they had never been introduced, so he pretended not to know that – allowed him to close her storm shutters and thanked him with a tin full of sugar cookies for him and his ‘lovely wife’. The neighbors on the other side – the Moens, a family of four, including two teenagers – were able-bodied enough to look after themselves, so he went back to the house.

Once inside, he found himself unable to settle down, jumping up every few minutes to check the weather. He texted Natasha, but he knew she wouldn’t leave the office unless they shut down production and sent everyone home. Sure enough, her reply – _Quit worrying. I’m fine. Hoping to be snowed in._ – confirmed her plans to stay as long as she could.

The knock at the front door an hour later broke his self-inflicted tension. Clint opened the door to find Coulson on the other side; he could stop worrying about one thing, anyway.  Coulson was a little underdressed; his winter coat was draped over one arm, but he was wearing a sweater, hat, and gloves, at least.

“Jeez, get in here,” Clint said, grabbing Coulson’s suitcase from him. “It’s fu- frickin’ cold out there, sir.”

Coulson stepped inside and hung up his coat, then stripped off his hat and gloves. “I’ve been in a car with a very efficient heater for the last hour. I was outside for less than a minute. But thank you for your concern.”

Clint shrugged, turning away before Coulson noticed his blush. “It’s really cold.” He waited for Coulson to take off his boots, and then showed him to bedroom he would be using. They spent the rest of the afternoon going over a few details that had been left out of their mission reports. Coulson didn’t have any new intel, and they agreed Natasha had the best chance of finding anything that would either end their investigation, or point them in a new direction.

Afterwards, Clint whipped up some supper. The wind picked up, whistling past the dining room window as they ate, and the snow fell thick and fast. Clint’s phone rang halfway through the meal; Natasha was on the other end.

“Hi, Clint. I lost track of time, and now I’ve been snowed in at work. I’m so sorry, honey. We probably won’t get out of here for hours, maybe not even until tomorrow morning.” Her voice was overly apologetic; someone was within earshot.

“Stay where you are, baby, your safety is more important than getting home to me. Phil and I can get through one night without you.” Clint took full advantage of the opportunity to use the endearment; Natasha hated being called baby.

“Oh, Uncle Phil made it? Give him a big kiss hello from me, won’t you?”

“Sure will, sweetheart,” he said through gritted teeth.

“Love you, bye-bye.” She hung up before he could answer.

“Nat says hello,” he told Coulson.

Coulson looked amused. “You’re getting on each other’s nerves, I see.”

“She started it,” Clint muttered. He stuck his phone back in his pocket. Natasha might call with updates, or if she ran into trouble, not that he was in any position to provide backup. The truck had 4-wheel drive, but that was no guarantee that they wouldn’t get stuck along the way.

A strong gust of wind rattled the shutters, and he shivered. “It feel colder to you?”

Coulson nodded, rubbing his hands together. “Definitely.”

The heater came on just then, and Clint held his hand over a vent. The air coming out of it was ice cold. “That’s not good.” The thermostat was set to 68 degrees, so that wasn’t the problem. He slipped on his shoes and went down into the basement to check the furnace, which told him absolutely nothing, beyond the fact that it was plugged in. He could fix a lot of things, but furnaces were not among them. He went back upstairs to tell Coulson the bad news.

“We have a little problem. The heat isn’t working, and I don’t think anyone is going to come out in this weather to fix it.”

Coulson took the news with a philosophical shrug. “Do you have a space heater?”

“Nope.” Clint had done a complete inventory of the house when they first moved in a few months ago; he knew for sure there wasn’t one on the premises, something he would change as soon as he could get to the nearest store that sold them.

“Then I guess we’re sharing a bed tonight.” Coulson seemed as unmoved by their situation as he would be by losing a sock, but Clint was screaming internally. This could only end in total embarrassment, starting with sleep fondling and ending with grinding his morning wood against Coulson’s awesome ass. Maybe he should be the little spoon.

“We can steal the blankets from the other beds,” was all he said. He briefly entertained the idea that Natasha had set this up somehow, but he couldn’t figure out how. This was just fate, and fate obviously had it out for him.

Clint turned off the heat, so at least cold air wasn’t blowing through the house. They bundled up and sat on the couch eating cookies and watching crappy television until Coulson started nodding off. Then Clint grabbed the comforters from Natasha’s and Coulson’s beds while Coulson took his suitcase into Clint’s bedroom – he had the biggest bed, so it just made sense to use it. Coulson wasn’t coming to his bed, they would just be in the same bed at the same time; a very small but important distinction that he had to remember for his own sanity.

Clint changed into a long-sleeved Henley, sweatpants and a pair of thick socks for sleeping. Coulson came out of the bathroom in honest-to-God black silk pajamas.

“I prefer to sleep on the left,” Clint said after a moment of tense silence.

“I know,” Coulson said, and Clint felt like an idiot. Like they hadn’t shared safe houses and hotel rooms before. Clint slid into bed, shivering a bit when his shirt rode up, exposing his back to the chilly sheets. Coulson got in next to him, and they both pulled the blankets up to their chins.

“Good night, sir.”

“Good night, Barton.”

They both turned onto their sides, backs to each other. As far as Clint could tell, Coulson dropped off right away, but he lay awake, reminding himself over and over again that they were only doing this for warmth, until he finally fell asleep.

Sometime later, Clint half woke in the darkness. His face was cold, but the rest of him was warm. Very warm. He pulled the blanket up over his ear, snuggled deeper into the warmth at his back, and fell back to sleep.

Clint was dreaming. There was an arm around his waist, not trapping him, but…cradling him, keeping him safe and warm. A hand was tucked up under his shirt, caressing his stomach. He wanted that hand to move lower and wrap around his cock. He could feel himself getting hard just thinking about it, but the hand stayed where it was, and he groaned in frustration. It was his dream, it should go the way he wanted it to, dammit. He rolled his hips, trying to give his lover – who else would he allow that close? – a hint about what he wanted.  Then the hand and arm disappeared, and he was suddenly cold and alone. He rolled over, latching on to the missing warmth. He kissed the back of his lover’s neck and drifted off into another dream.

Someone was grinding their ass against his erection. He thrust against them, his hand on their hip to hold them still. He was annoyed at the layers of cloth between them, even if the silk under his fingers did feel good.

Silk? Coulson was wearing silk. Clint came fully awake, hoping that it was just a dream, that he wasn’t really dry-humping his handler in his sleep. As he suspected, his luck wasn’t that good. He flopped onto his back and threw an arm over his face, blocking out the faint morning light that filled the room. Maybe if he pretended to be asleep, Coulson would pretend this had never happened.

“Clint?” Coulson said quietly. So much for pretending.

“Yeah?” He didn’t move his arm; he wasn’t ready to see Coulson’s kind indifference as he tried to let him down easy.

“Maybe we should try this when we’re both awake?”

“Huh?” Did Coulson just say- Maybe he _was_ dreaming. Clint peeked out from under his arm. “Yeah?”

“Is that an answer?” Coulson was smiling gently, his hair sticking out at crazy angles, and Clint decided this was really happening, because there was no way he would ever imagine Coulson’s hair doing that.

Coulson moved his arm out of the way and kissed him. Clint thought briefly of morning breath, and then stopped thinking entirely when he felt the tip of Coulson’s tongue against his lips. Coulson was tugging at his shirt, lifting it out of the way to get his hands under it. Clint flinched at his cold touch.

“Jesus, your fingers are freezing.” Clint rolled them until Coulson was on his back. Coulson brought his knees up, allowing Clint to settle between them. Then he pulled the tangled blankets up over them both. “Let’s get you warmed up.”

Coulson smirked and stuck his hands down the back of Clint’s pants. Clint yelped.

“I think this will warm me up faster.”

“Oh, you’re playing with fire now.”

==

“This is shocking. I might not recover from this.” Natasha’s cool voice woke Clint from the light doze he had fallen into after a very satisfying orgasm at Coulson’s hands. Coulson was still beside him, dead to the world.

“What? Recover?” He wasn’t usually this slow to catch on, even if he had just woken up.

“My husband, in bed with another man. How could you do this to me?” Natasha perched on the end of the bed and studied her nails.

Clint’s eyes narrowed. The blankets had been kicked to the floor, and he and Coulson were covered to the waist by a thin sheet. Clint was sweating slightly.

“The furnace wasn’t working. We were freezing our balls off all night.” His earlier thought, that Natasha had somehow arranged this, surfaced with more certainty.

“That's strange. It’s working just fine now.”

“Nat-“

“How kind of you to keep each other’s balls from actually freezing off. It’s what any friend would do, yes?”

“Nat-“

“No need to thank me.” She patted his foot under the sheet.  “Good morning, Coulson. I’ll start the coffee, but one of you is cooking breakfast for me.” With that, she got up to leave.

Clint looked over to find Coulson awake and smiling at him. “She- the furnace- I’m not cooking anything for you,” he told her as she went out the door.

“Yes, you are. I found what we need to get us out of this frozen hell. I want waffles,” she called back, already halfway to the kitchen.

Clint looked back at Coulson. “I think she did something to the furnace.”

“I know she did. I just chose not to fix it.”

“How do either of you even know anything about furnaces? Never mind. I guess I'm making waffles.” He hopped out of bed, searching for his sweatpants. Fuck, he was still wearing his socks. So sexy.

“I prefer pancakes.” Coulson sat up, but made no move to get out of bed.

“And I want a blowjob, but we don't always get what we want, do we?” He pulled on his pants and a shirt, determined to ignore the cute not-pout on Coulson’s face. How did he do that? “Fine. Pancakes. Pancakes and waffles. Fucking hell.”

“Thanks, dear.”

Oh, it was on now.

As Natasha had promised, there was coffee waiting when he got downstairs. She had even pulled out the pancake mix and the waffle iron. Even so, Clint grumbled through mixing up the batter and heating the waffle iron. He grumbled even louder when he pulled out the griddle for the pancakes.

Coulson showed up just as he was pouring the first cup of batter into the waffle iron.

“Cracking the case wins first breakfast. Deceitful handlers can wait in line," he said when he saw Coulson's raised eyebrow.

“Deceit is such a strong word.” Coulson poured himself a cup of coffee and sat at the table with Natasha.

“I was cold, Coulson. Very cold. And you had the power to fix that.”

“I thought I had. Is he always like this?” he asked Natasha, as if he had never seen Clint first thing in the morning.

“I was hoping sex would improve his mood and stop all the whining. You’ll have to try something else. A gag?” Natasha said seriously. She was laughing her ass off at him, at least on the inside; Clint would never hear the end of it.

Coulson laughed. Actually laughed. Now that they were teaming up against him, Clint definitely had his work cut out for him.

“That’s it. I’m burning breakfast.”

 


End file.
